<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Slipping Away by onlyhereforellick</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28038471">Slipping Away</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/onlyhereforellick/pseuds/onlyhereforellick'>onlyhereforellick</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Angstober '20 [18]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>NCIS</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, fictober 20, yes it’s almost January don’t bother me</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-11 00:15:40</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>412</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28038471</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/onlyhereforellick/pseuds/onlyhereforellick</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
      <p>Fictober ‘20 - “You don’t see it?”</p>
    </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Ellie Bishop/Nick Torres</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Angstober '20 [18]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1952188</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Slipping Away</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Fictober ‘20 - “You don’t see it?”</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Nick felt like his feet weighed two tons. Stuck in the ground like Ellie’s axe stuck in the stump.</p>
<p>Her words lilted back to his ears as if a record scratch across the sky.</p>
<p>...<em>falling in love with you</em>...<br/>...<em>don’t know if I can love you anymore</em>...</p>
<p>His ears rang like high pitched buzzards as his mind raced to process the bomb she’d just dropped. All the while he could hear the crunch of leaves under her boots indicating her slipping away, further and further away from him—<em>in more ways than one</em>, he thought.</p>
<p>Finally his feet released from their stronghold and Nick spun around, arms waving wildly in front of him. He couldn’t hide the crazed and desperate tone from his voice if he tried, “Ellie, wait!”</p>
<p>He saw her shoulders tense but she kept on, otherwise undeterred. In bounding strides he closed the distance instantly. His hand lightly caught her wrist on its swing back, pleading her to pause.</p>
<p>She halted yet didn’t turn. Just like before.</p>
<p>Nick soldiered on regardless.</p>
<p>“You don’t see it?” The question hung in the dead chill of the air. She didn’t make a sound, move a muscle. He repeated himself, “You don’t see it? Don’t see how I feel about you? Don’t see how I <em>ache</em> for you? Don’t see the happiness you being me? Don’t see the anguish in my eyes when you’re with another guy? Don’t see the joy you’ve brought me? Don’t see the wreck you’ve made me? Don’t see the absolute fool I’ve become, treading unchartered waters? Don’t see just how much I want you, and only you? You don’t see it? See how much you <em>weigh</em> on me?”</p>
<p>Nick heard her breath hitch at the words he know he used in Jack’s office. He couldn’t take them back but he could use them truthfully this time. Lay it out there, lay it on the line.</p>
<p>And hope like hell she’d see him, forgive him...maybe even love him again.</p>
<p>“You know what I see, Nick?” She’d asked, rhetorically to the tree line in front of her, back still to him. Her tone reserved, far-off almost as if she was already transported away from this conversation—and him, a distant memory. Ellie sighed, pivoting slowly as her hand deftly shrugged his off her wrist and continued, golden emerald eyes devoid of their usual spark unmoving from his, “I see a sorry excuse for what my heart thought was love.”</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>